Vanished: Millionaire newlywed, 81, still missing

Oct. 8, 2009

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

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Fontelle Harrod caresses a doorknocker bearing the family name she shares with her husband, Bob Harrod, at the couple's Placentia home Oct. 7. "I hope he knocks on the door someday," she says. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Fontelle Harrod holds a photo of her missing husband, Bob Harrod, in the couple's Placentia home Oct. 7. He vanished without a trace on July 27 and police are investigating the disappearance as a possible homicide since there is no evidence pointing to the contrary. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Fontelle Harrod looks at a photo taken just minutes after she married Bob Harrod in June. He vanished without a trace on July 27 and police are investigating the disappearance as a possible homicide since there is no evidence pointing to the contrary. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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A half-used package of Bic disposable razor blades sits in Bob Harrod's toiletry cupboard Oct. 7. Mr. Harrod, 81, vanished without a trace on July 27 and police are investigating the disappearance as a possible homicide since there is no evidence pointing to the contrary. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Bob Harrod's reading glasses sit on the kitchen table, surrounded by mail Oct. 7. "He needs those to read," Fontelle Harrod, his wife, explained. "He wouldn't have just left them." JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Bob Harrod's slippers sit beside the bed Oct. 7, right where he left them the day he vanished without a trace July 27. "They should be there if he comes home," says Fontelle Harrod, his wife. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Bob Harrod's collection of bolo ties lay on a dresser top in his bedroom Oct. 7, right where he left them the day he vanished without a trace July 27. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

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Fontelle Harrod caresses a doorknocker bearing the family name she shares with her husband, Bob Harrod, at the couple's Placentia home Oct. 7. "I hope he knocks on the door someday," she says. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

On the left is Robert Harrod's first ife, the late Georgia Harrod. The three women on the right areRoberta Brady, Paula Borcher and Julie Michaels, Harrod's daughters. The photo was taken at Harrod's retirement party. Photo courtesy of Roberta Brady.

Fontelle Harrod caresses a doorknocker bearing the family name she shares with her husband, Bob Harrod, at the couple's Placentia home Oct. 7. "I hope he knocks on the door someday," she says. JOSHUA SUDOCK, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Things were going pretty well this summer for Robert Merle Harrod.

Until he vanished.

A wealthy Placentia man, Harrod, 81, was just getting over the prolonged ordeal of his first wife Georgia's death in 2008.

To battle his loneliness, he had rekindled an old flame – a woman to whom he had been engaged in Missouri before the Korean War. She flew out to visit, and the two married at the county courthouse in Fullerton June 29 after a whirlwind re-ignition of their romance.

Late in July, Bob Harrod was cleaning out some clutter from the home he and his first wife had shared in central Placentia. He was preparing the home for Fontelle Harrod – his new 75-year-old wife – to move in.

She had been settling her affairs back in Missouri so she could join her new husband.

July 27, two days before Fontelle Harrod's plane touched down at LAX, nothingness swallowed up Bob Harrod, leaving Placentia Police, his friends and family baffled more than two months later.

Whether he left on his own or was the victim of a crime is a mystery of the most befuddling kind. In real life, no one is lurking in the library with a candlestick waiting to be discovered.

"Any theory that we have is beset by problems that make it either unworkable or illogical," said Placentia Police Det. Corinne Loomis, one of the lead investigators in the first weeks of the case and a spokeswoman for the department. "It's like a water balloon; when you squeeze it in one place, it pops out in another."

Though there is no evidence to suggest that someone killed Bob Harrod, there's no evidence to suggest someone didn't.

"We've treated this as a homicide investigation," said Placentia Police Chief Jim Anderson. "Because you can't go back in time and retrieve evidence. But our chief concern is for Mr. Harrod's safety."

But the possibility that Bob Harrod is holed up in a hotel somewhere has grown slimmer over the past months, police say. His wallet and keys were gone when he disappeared, but his car and glasses were left behind.

Police report there has been zero activity recorded in any of his bank or credit accounts.

THE DISAPPEARANCE

Police say Bob Harrod's son-in-law Jeff Michaels was doing work at the house July 27 in preparation for Fontelle Harrod's arrival.

Michaels told police he left the house for Home Depot to buy supplies around 2:30 p.m., and time stamped-receipts bear him out, Loomis said.

About 2:30 p.m. was the last time anyone says they saw Bob Harrod.

Michaels said he returned to the house after 3 p.m. to find the Harrods' longtime maid sitting on the front stoop, saying the door was locked. Bob Harrod talked to the housekeeper on the phone earlier that morning and told her to come.

Michaels told police he thought Bob Harrod may have retired for a nap, and said he let himself and the maid in the back door.

Bob Harrod wasn't in sight, but his keys and wallet were gone. Michaels told police he concluded Bob Harrod had visited a neighbor or gone for a walk. Michaels finished his tasks and the housekeeper cleaned and left. Michaels locked the house and headed home to Running Springs outside San Bernardino.

Harrod's daughter Julie Michaels, Jeff Michael's wife, called the house later that night, and there was no answer. She called her sisters, Roberta Brady and Paula Borcher.

They called Placentia Police to do a welfare check at the residence, Brady said. Officers found the house was as empty as Michaels said he left it.

Bob Harrod's daughters called Fontelle Harrod in Missouri, and she called in a missing persons report to police.

July 28 passed as police began the search – interviewing Michaels, the housekeeper and neighbors. Nobody saw Bob Harrod after 2:30 p.m. July 27.

July 29, Fontelle arrived, and the media got wind of the disappearance.

THE AFTERMATH

Notes written in Bob Harrod's hand found around the house indicate Bob Harrod intended to put his new wife's name on various accounts, Loomis said. Police say that, including properties and other assets, Bob Harrod was a multi-millionaire.

Bob Harrod and his three daughters had an argument over finances the Sunday before he vanished.

His daughter, Roberta, acknowledged the exchange, saying her father lost his temper. She said he had failed to provide copies of their mother's will, which he was obligated to do because of the financial mechanisms set up by the estate.

"It wasn't a heated meeting," she said in a phone interview. "Dad got heated. He's very selfish, very conditional. The day before he went missing in the afternoon, he was going to provide us copies of the will, and we went over to get the copies. He didn't have them."

Fontelle Harrod said several days after Bob Harrod disappeared, his three daughters came to his house where Fontelle was staying and told her she wasn't entitled to any of their father's assets.

According to records from Orange County Probate Court, Brady and Borcher filed a petition for conservatorship to gain control of their father's assets Aug. 7.

Fontelle Harrod is contesting the action and is still living in Bob Harrod's house, with the locks changed.

Brady said they brought the matter to court because they wanted to free up some of the money to offer a reward for information leading to Bob Harrod's whereabouts, as well as money to pay for bills and maintenance at the house.

The judge ruled against them.

Records pertaining to the case in probate are sealed, and the next hearing is Nov. 10.

WHAT HAPPENED?

There are no suspects, Loomis said. There's not even any evidence of a crime.

The three daughters told police initially they suspected Bob Harrod's barber – a woman who attended their mother's funeral in 2008 – of some connection with the disappearance. Police have cleared the barber and her husband of any connection with the case.

Loomis said simple logic would dictate that Bob Harrod's money would be the motive for someone to get rid of him, which would hypothetically connect Harrod's daughters to the disappearance. But Jeff Michaels' story checks out, and neither he nor any of the daughters are suspects in the disappearance, Loomis said.

Julie and Jeff Michaels, contacted through Roberta Brady, would not comment for this story.

Add in the timing of the disappearance – when the maid was scheduled to arrive – and it makes foul play even more improbable. If the hypothetical abductor were to have waited an hour or two more, he could have acted and Bob Harrod wouldn't be missed for a day and a half, Loomis said.

If a stranger had abducted Bob Harrod, it would be necessary for that stranger to have lured Harrod out of his house. That would have been something the neighbors had noticed, Loomis reasoned, which no one did.

Plus, if he were snatched, why did Bob Harrod lock the front door and bring his wallet and keys?

Fontelle Harrod and her children by previous marriages wouldn't have anything to gain by Harrod's disappearance, either.

Loomis said that though Fontelle's family isn't wealthy, they are solidly middle-class. More importantly, Harrod hadn't signed anything over to Fontelle Harrod by the time he disappeared, and both Loomis and Fontelle Harrod herself said Fontelle had no idea how rich Bob Harrod was before he disappeared.

What if Bob Harrod left on his own accord? He was a lucid, adult man, but he didn't take his glasses or his car, and he left when he knew his son-in-law and maid would miss him.

Had Bob Harrod waited a couple hours longer, he could have taken his car and been in Texas or farther before anyone missed him – he could have ditched it wherever he stopped if he were worried about being traced, Loomis said.

If, contrary to his doctor's statements, he were beset by some dementia and wandered off, overwhelming odds are that he would have appeared at a nearby intersection or shopping center, disoriented and drawing attention to himself – especially with his face all over television and the newspapers, Loomis said.

"It doesn't make any sense," she said.

Harrod spoke to several people on his home telephone the day he disappeared. Police seized those phone records, and they aren't giving out the numbers to anyone.

Chief Anderson was cryptic in his responses during an interview about the future of the investigation.

"I don't want to show my hand to you," he said. "We have a couple of ongoing roads we're going to go down. I don't want to alert possible suspects. We have nothing to focus on directly yet."

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